therealstevesmith

AI to Nuggets. Asian Kids Work Overtime

                              December 20, @))^

      I don't know if the Denver Nuggets will become a contender with Allen Iverson, but I'm sure jerseys are being made somewhere not in America to celebrate this refreshing change.

      You tell me who owns the Nuggets, but I'll tell you he's about to get PIF like a mug.

       "Wake up those girls with the tiny hands, we got some jerseys to make! I don't care if they have to up the pay to $1.50 a day, let's git er done... 'What'?"

      I'd come hard (as always) and start with a classic David Thompson, real smooth, like you could rock dress shoes with it. Sell just a thousand of those at $169.99 a pop and that'll probably take care of the reserved parking spot for the year, right dey.

     Only then would I come with the current Denver jersey, using the leftover profit from the classic jersey to pay for the cost of the increased order to that shop that used to be in America. Hey, the NBA is a global sport.

      After all the kids have the new New Iverson jersey, then you can dip in with a tight Alex English (hood alert! click this) style one. The irony being of course that neither man has ever been recognized for ALL of his skills.

      If you don't think Allen Iverson is perfect for any team he plays for, then you must know a lot about astronomy.

      Meanwhile, let's hope those jersey makers don't have to use that new NBA ball in the corporate gym.

Awesome Sports Weekend

                                 June 16, 2006

      Saturday afternoon-  USA vs. Italy in World Cup Futbol. Sam put on an awful and uninspired performance against the Czech team

      Saturday night -  Jermain Taylor vs. Winky Wright on HBO and a replay of the Bernard Hopkins/Anotonio Tarver fight for those who may have missed it.  Taylor is the guy who beat up Hopkins twice and Winky Wright destroyed Felix Trinidad last year. This could be a great fight if they aren't too cautious.

      Sunday afternoon -  Mighty Brazil in World cup action. They were underwhelming in their first game and now must make a "statement" in this tilt.

      Sunday night -   NBA Finals, Game 5.  With Mavericks' Stackhouse suspended for his hard foul on Shaq, does Dallas have a chance?

My Predictions

                        May 2, 2006

    Of all the predictions I've been oh so correct about, two of them have surprisingly yet to come true.

    The first is that someday a field goal kicker will get his (or her) ass kicked by their own team for missing an easy game winning chip shot.

     After watching tonights playoff action, the second might be coming closer to fruition.

     One day an NBA ref will receive a well deserved punch in the fucking mouth.

     It all started when I watched Shaquille O'neal awarded 10 free throws in the first six minutes the Heat's game 5 tilt vs. Chicago.  He got more touch fouls than a pedophile. The Bulls Tyson Chandler had 3 fouls before anyone could even see if they had the lucky number in their program to shoot the mid-court shot at halftime. 

     When the refs start cheating immediately, it sorta takes the fun out of the original "reality TV" (sports). It makes it more like watching the Academy Awards or an election involving George Bush.

Who Refs the Refs

                    March 24, 2006

       I love the NCAA tournament as much as anyone, but I think I hate shitty refs more than most.   My bracket's shot, my teams are out, yet I watch the UCONN-Washington game and I feel like finding the ref's addresses.  They probably cheat at 'Horse' in their own backyards, spelling that shit, "H-O-R-Z," talking about, "That's it, I won! Game over, BABY!"

      I mean, does a ref have to call traveling when the guy is literally being pulled down by the opposing player?  How about giving a foul and a technical to the Washington star player, making him go from 2 to 4 fouls in 0.5 seconds?  How does a ref call a loose ball foul on Washington, under their own basket, when there are 10 long arms looking like a Kung Fu movie?

      I have UCONN WINNING the championship, but damn, Jim Calhoun probably doesn't even want it this way.  So I went to the leading authority on bunk reffing, and I was not let down.

Winning to Be Hated

      February 22, 2006

          Shani Davis does make it clear that times have changed since Jackie Robinson was snubbed by Adolf Hitler or Jesse Owens' wife was getting heckled in the stands during Dodger games.

          If you ask me, I think Shani Davis and Chad Hendrick should settle it by having a foot race, but I don't always play fair.

          But on the isreal, if you've seen one racist reaction to a sports hero, haven't you seen them all?

           Here's an great article I found (really quickly, too) on the internets that explains the controversy and why it matters.  To this cat I'll defer for now. 

Who Pissed in the Gumbel

                      February 20, 2006

        People in mainstream media are going to be mad at Bryant Gumbel this week because he spoke on television.  And instead being fodder for all the haters who think it's sooo funny to question his "blackness", Mr. Gumbel actually dropped some reality to the crowd who thinks Justin Timberlake is the new Michael Jackson. 

Here are Gumbel's comments about the X Games with skating.... better known as the Winter Olympics:

Try not to laugh when someone says these are the world's greatest athletes, despite a paucity of blacks that makes the games look like a GOP convention," Gumbel said on the program. "And try to blot out all logic when announcers and sportswriters pretend to care about the luge, the skeleton, the biathlon and all those other events they don't understand and totally ignore for all but three weeks every four years. Face it: These Olympics are little more than a marketing plan."

   And boy are the right wing chicken hawks squawking.  They've decided to go with the, "If I said 'Black people's butts are too big for the luge' then I'd lose my job," distraction. 

I can't blame them because it does seem to work.  It never counts that these same sports talk anchors can call Terrell Owens a idiot, Kobe Bryant a rapist,  claim Derek Jeter isn't Black, make horse noises when describing WNBA players and keep their jobs.  One Al Campanis reference is all it takes to make right wingers think, "Oh my God, the dark skinned people are taking over."  Is there a law that can be made?

   Rush Limpbro even compared it to the comments he made regarding Donovan McNabb being a media creation and wondered aloud if Gumbel would be fired.

   So I guess he's still on drugs.

    Besides being correct, is there anything wrong with Mr. Gumbel's statement?   I remember Air Force's football coach, Fisher DeBerry saying he needed more 'Afro-American' players because his team was too slow, and everyone was so eager to "rush" to his defense. Where's the love for Bryant Gumbel?  All he's saying is it's impossible to have the world's greatest athletes if there's only one African-American out there (and needless to say, he's beating everybody).

    So watch the contests if it keeps you away from "American Idol."   But don't let the people holding the entire deck accuse Bryant Gumbel of playing the race card.

Patriots Defeat Broncos, 13-10

                                         January 14, 2006

The New England Patriots continued their pursuit of an unprecedented three consecutive Super Bowl wins with a victory over the Denver Broncos....

   Wait, this just in. The officials have given the Broncos 17 extra points by making bullshit calls.

   Final score: Broncos 27 - Patriots 13.  And you thought we'd remember 9/11 forever.

Broncos vs. Patriots 3rd Quarter

   January 14, 2006

   That was a Touchback on the Bailey interception.  Stop CHEATING. And these punk ass announcers.  Phil (Dim) Simms said he saw the angle that would reverse the call.  Then when they don't reverse it, he starts slobbing all over the NFL's nuts talkin, "Oh, it was an impossible play to overturn." That, reader, is the definition of a pieback.

Hell Freezes Over Or A Warm Evening in Denver

   January 14, 2006  (Halftime of Patriots vs. Broncos)

    Man I hate the Denver Broncos.  That pass interference call against the Patriots was the worst piece of officiating since Michael Jordan threw Bryan Russell out of the way to hit that game winning shot at Utah in '98. How does a ref want to inject himself into a game so badly that he cheats on a judgement call?  It pisses me off, because I just want to see a good game in a sport I love, and now some insurance company exec is going to give the ball to Denver on the one yard line.  Yale could score from the one yard line.

  Then, on Denver's lucky field goal, the replay clearly showed a Bronco tackle offsides. And I always thought their offensive lineman didn't talk to the media because someone might ask them about all the cut and crackback blocking they do, jeopordizing people's careers and shit.

   So that's their ten points at the half, right there. It's gonna be sweet when they lose, and I'm not even a Patriots fan.

   At some point the NFL will have to asses the penalizing of pass interference at the spot of the foul. It's silly to have a challenge system that doesn't allow a review of the harshest penalty in the sport, when interference is the toughest call to make correctly.

Owens Feels TheRealSteveSmith

  Christmas '05

  Cancel your GQ subscription and bookmark this blog!

   Here's me on Dec 3.

Terrell Owens  - I hope he realizes how quickly the media has chosen to embrace the Bengals' Chad Johnson.  Three years ago when Owens stood on the Dallas Cowboys' star at the fifty yard line after scoring a touchdown, the media called him an insolent cretin (and sent me to my dictionary).  This season, Chad Johnson does "the riverdance" after scoring a touchdown and the media treats him like Patrick Swayze.  Owens should have never thought he was popular.     (Full post)

  Now here's Terrell Owens, to GQ magazine, released on Dec 16.

Owens wonders if the media is out to get him.

“The things that I’ve done in the past, like celebrate in the end zone, they’re making a fanfare out of it now with (Bengals wide receiver) Chad Johnson,” Owens said. “With all the celebrations that he’s done, they’re like congratulating him for it. But if it was me, they’d be like, ’Oh, we don’t need this in football, this is not good for football.’ Not that Chad is doing something wrong, it’s not his fault, but you kind of wonder, do they have it out for me?”    (Full article)

  So now that Owens has learned that, what will he do?  He'd be smart to recognize that he has true fans, and not change to please the fickle and biased media. His agent saved a little boys life, and still gets treated like he threw the Baby Ruth (tm) in the swimming pool. Owens reward will come by sustaining the onslaught, and in ten or twenty years he'll be known as the cagey ex jock who always gave a straight answer blah whatnot.